(Excerpted from the new book, Triune Brain, Triune Mind, Triune Worldview (Brighton
Publishing)(available at Amazon and Barnes and Noble).
What one is
taught and chooses to learn about religion changes the biology of the brain.
Changing brain biology is likely to change who and what you are as a person.
This principle applies to everyone, religious or irreligious.
Learning
Changes the Brain. One's original DNA does not control everything
about brain structure or general mental properties. The genetically inheritable
component has been determined from identical twin studies to be about 40-50%.[i] Environment,
especially learning, controls the rest. Thus, what this means is that what one
learns, including religious ideas, can change your brain.
When
the brain learns something new, it creates a new pattern of nerve impulses
flowing around networks of neurons. This impulse pattern is the brain’s way or
representing the information, and as long as the pattern representation exists,
as in working memory, you have conscious access to it. If that pattern can continue
intact for some time with subsequent rehearsal, it may induce gene expression
in neurons to store the representation as a more lasting memory. This process involves
the necessary protein synthesis for the information-relevant synapses. Such
synthesis enables proliferation of more dendrites and axon terminals. These new
proteins create the structure of new synapses, and an increase in both number
of neurotransmitter molecules and postsynaptic receptor proteins.[ii]
Everything
we learn from what we see, hear, smell, feel, taste, or even imagine can
potentially change the structure and networking of our brains. Should we not
expect the same of religious learning? Brain scans suggest that one part of the
brain, the anterior cingulate gyrus, seems especially sensitive to such
effects.[iii]
However, the brain can be damaged by belief in a wrathful and punishing God. A
chronic fear that God regards you as an enemy inevitably produces emotional
distress. The continual bathing of brain in cortisol released during chronic
stress causes synaptic junctions to shrink. Such shrinkage is evident in the
hippocampus, a large cluster of neurons that are crucial for processing
emotions and for forming memories.[iv]
Reduced function in this structure may create thinking limitations. In other
words, belief in a wrathful God impairs mental health. Scripture is replete
with admonitions to fear God. A healthier admonition is to be more attune to
God’s expectations and hopes for you.
All
cells are susceptible to genetic mutation, which in the case of neurons could
likely change circuit connectivity. A startling recent discovery of enormous
implications challenges the accepted dogma that all of a person's cells have
the same genetic coding. It turns out that this is not true in neurons. The DNA
in each nerve cell has hundreds of mutations of the A-T, C-G nucleotides that
constitute the genetic code for the neuron.[v] No
two neurons are identical. The study was conducted by 18 research teams at 15 U.S. institutions,
formed as a consortium by the National Institute of Mental Health to
examine neural genetic
coding, using repositories of postmortem brain tissue taken from both healthy
people and those with various mental diseases.
The
scientists have no explanation at present for the cause of so many mutations in
neurons and for why each neuron has a different genetic profile. The most obvious
possibility might be that the mutations occurred as transcription errors during
cell division. We don't know when these mutations occur. Except for granule
cells in the hippocampus and cerebellum, neurons generally do not divide after
the first few days after birth. If cell division is the cause of mutations, the
mutations likely occurred in the fetus and during the early post-natal period.
More likely, life’s learning experiences cause many of these genetic changes.
These
startling findings of so much genetic diversity in neurons open a completely
new field of research. Scientists need to examine different cell types in other
organs to see if each cell in the organ has the identical genes.
There
is a related aspect. Each neuron differs not only in its genes, but also in
which genes are expressed. The new field of "epigenetics" has
revealed that environmental influences, ranging from drugs, toxins, metabolites,
and perhaps even lifestyles, can affect the expression of genes. In the case of
brain, there is the distinct possibility that one's mental life can affect gene
expression.
So
far, what I have said about gene change and expression refers to single individuals.
But what if some of these gene mutations or epigenetic effects also occur in
sex cells? That would mean that traits acquired during one's lifetime could
transfer to future generations. I would hope that the research consortium that
has made this monumental discovery about brain cells would extend its charter
to examine sperm and ova.
Recent research on the genetics of
the classic animal model of brain function, C. elegans, reveals that epigenetic
inheritance of neuronal traits does occur.[vi]
Gene expression was modified by exposing the animals to high temperatures, and
the genetic change transferred via both ova and sperm to offspring that had no
exposure to high temperature. The epigenetic change was still present some 5-14
generations later.
To the extent that the findings of both of
these studies can be extrapolated to humans, we must now consider the possibility
that personal lifestyle, environmental, and cultural influences on people may
be propagated to successive generations of their children. Bad environments and
lifestyle choices may extend well into the future, magnifying the deleterious
consequences through multiple generations. We now have to consider that medical
and behavioral problems, poverty, and degenerate cultures can arise when not
only people make poor choices but also that the effects can be genetically
propagated to subsequent generations. Is this a basis for scripture that asserts
the sins of the fathers will be visited upon the sons? It isn’t a matter of
fairness. It is basic biology.
Recent research discloses how what the brain
thinks, feels, and does affects its own structure and function. For one thing, synaptic
connections and network configurations respond to neural activity. The idea was
first advanced by Daniel Hebb, who famously said, “neurons that fire together
wire together.” Firing of impulses change the synaptic junctions that receive
the voltage shocks of nerve impulses. Hebb meant the comment to explain the
formation of memories. But the idea can be extended more generally as an
explanation of how the brain programs itself.
Associated with real-time changes in
synaptic strength and circuit formation, the environment and even brain
activity creates genetic changes. Recent discoveries place new importance on
the genetic effects of RNA. Originally, scientists emphasized how RNA allowed
translation of the code in DNA to specify the selective manufacture of proteins.
Now we know there are many kinds of RNA with far different functions.[vii]
There is a circular RNA, with unknown function. Gene expression is influenced
by several kinds of RNA (cis-natural antisense RNA, enhancer RNA, long
noncoding RNA, microRNA, small interfering RNA, and many others).
Neuroscientists have known for decades that the brain is readily modified. We
likely have underestimated this “neuroplasticity.”
In the next post, we will explore specific
ways in which we program our brains to accept and live religious ideas. Relevant
learning principles include neural plasticity, learning attitudes, the brain’s
self-programming, and the various kinds of conditioning. Everyday topics
covered will include the brain’s self-programming, child rearing, neural
development, and aging,
To be continued in next post
[i] Spector, Tim (2013). What twins reveal about the science
of faith. Popular Science. http://www.popsci.com/sciencetarticle/2013-08/what-twins-reveal-about-god-gene,
Aug. 8. Retrieved Aug 29, 2018.
[ii] Klemm, W. R. (2012). Memory
Power 101. New York: Skyhorse.
[iii] Newberg, A. and Waldman, M.R (2009). How God
Changes Your Brain: Breakthrough
Findings from a Leading Neuroscientist.
New York: Ballantine Books.
[iv] Owen, A. D. et al. (2011) Religious factors and
hippocampal atrophy in late life. PLoS ONE. 6(3), e17006.
doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0017006
[v] McConnell, M. J. et al. (2017).Intersection of diverse
neuronal genomes and neuropsychiatric diseases: The brain somatic mosaicism
network. Science. 356(6336), 395. doi:
10.1126/scienceaa1641.
[vi] Klosin, Adam et al. (2017). Transgenerational transmission
of environmental information in C. elegans. Science. 356 (6335), 320-323.
[vii] Williams, Ruth. (2017). The RNA age: a primer. The
Scientist. May 11. http://www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/49322/title/The-RNA-Age--A-primer/&utm_campaign=NEWSLETTER_TS_The-Scientist-Daily_2016&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=51867147&_hsenc=p2ANqtz--5Y6L__mQ5g5cwWMxpaXeBqIplViYJrGmBsktGENQ5mQxzW1JpTJFoM9lTG13Er6g8dCIoSgZWAaYX9MxePbLCLWMrPw&_hsmi=51867149/
